'I knew everything that day was a great moment in history'

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»Play VideoFILE - Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. acknowledges the crowd at the Lincoln Memorial for his "I Have a Dream" speech during the March on Washington, D.C. in this Aug. 28, 1963 file photo. (AP Photo/File)

BOISE, Idaho (KBOI) -- Yvonne McCoy, raised in the south, was just 15 when she attended the March on Washington in August 1963.

But even at such a tender age, the significance of the day was not lost on her.

"I knew everything that day was a great moment in history," she says. "The fact that there were so many people there from, all walks of life, all gathered for the same purpose -- to march for freedom."

McCoy joined two other local witnesses to the Washington march at a Boise ceremony to commemorate the 50th anniversary Wednesday, part of a nationwide celebration of the landmark peaceful event attended by some 250,000 at whicbh Dr. Martin Luther KIng Jr. delivered his famous "I Have A Dream" speech.

One of the multitude, Karl Shurtliff, raised in eastern Idaho, living in Washington then, says he went to the march that day out of curiosity more than anything else.

"The thing about the crowd that impressed me is how respectful they were to one another," he remembers. "Respectful to the circumstance that brought them there, and why they were there."

"I marched, just like everybody else that day, to smash segregation," said Jack Owens.